Also, I forgot to add that the water pump had already been done before, but it did not want to come out. I had to make a puller tool after I broke off both sides of the casting when trying to use the threaded holes to push the pump away from the block.

Attached is the tool I made out of an old prybar, with tapped 1/2" holes. It was flat when I made it, the water pump was really in there.

For those interested, I had to go back in to replaced my oil filter housing o-rings/bush/gasket.

When I removed all of the parts up to the oil filter housing, it seemed to me that I could reach the pipe underneath the intake manifold. This seems like it may be an easier way to approach this project, and you don't have to remove the intake manifold risking debris entering the combustion chamber. Someone in an earlier post mentioned removing the battery and battery tray to reach the rear pipe. New coolant hoses may fish through okay, I'm not sure.

If done this way, you wouldn't have to remove the cluster of wires that rest on top of the lower intake manifold which are a pain to disconnect/reconnect blindly as you have to do, you could leave the fuel lines and injectors hooked up, and both manifolds could remain in their factory position. It took very little time to get to this state, whereas the "normal" way to get to this pipe has a lot of steps. It would be more difficult to get your hand in to change the parts, but I think it's doable and overall would take less time. Getting my hands in to connect the starter wires and a few other connectors from the top electrical connector box was a total pain for me.

I think so. If not, I think you could remove the pipe with the two 10mm bolts and pull it toward you to get more room for the rearmost hose, or remove the hose from whatever else it connects to and pull the pipe and hose out together.

Not a 318ti owner, but a 318i owner. I had the y-connector cause me some pain this week.

Long story short, I installed a defective thermostat. Which led to an overheat in the system and although I didn't blow my HG (mechanic said my compression levels were "on the money" but there could be a pinhole leak), the y-connector burst clean off.

I don't have the stomach to replace it myself so I forked over $300 in labor for my local mechanic to do it.